What Lies Ahead
by bpwx
Summary: When Calvin MacTavish and his little brother Isaiah, two scions of a small Irish-American family, find themselves trapped during the zombie apocalypse, they are saved by the most diverse and interesting group the world could muster; our Atlanta survivors. This will be very much an AU story and a pair of OC's and perhaps even more surprises! Rated M for obvious Walking Dead reasons.


As the sun made its inevitable rise over the seemingly never-ending columns of vehicles, ranging from cars, mobile homes, trucks, hell even a military jeep or two, Calvin sighed lightly. Another sunrise that Isaiah would go on and on about. Though he didn't necessarily hate or even dislike him for doing so, his younger brother could go on forever about miniscule things that he could give a shit less about. Just the other day, after they found that dead bear being mauled by the… things… Isaiah had not stopped for _hours_ about how he thought it died.

But Calvin MacTavish did not hate it; Isaiah was all that was left to him. All that remained of his family, of his friends, of his _life. _

All that remained to him since the 'plague' started.

That's what they were calling it near the end, before the TV's turned off. At first it was just a passing fancy on the news, nothing big or worthy of figuratively breaking it. The first glimpse of it -nobody knows where it all started but Calvin and their old man had had suspicions that it all started near the Florida border- in the news was in between a storm warning near Atlanta and addressing the decreasing of crime in the same city. Calvin remembered it clearly, and he suspected he would for the rest of his life.

Calvin frowned deeply, looking down at his lap that cradled the jar of peanuts they found in one of the cars nearby. He considered taking a handful but decided that Isaiah needed them more than he did. Calvin could go a half a day without eating without feeling any need to. Isaiah, however, whined all day if he didn't have his three meals. Something that was scarce as hell these days.

He sighed and slowly rose off the ragged lawn chair he sat in all night; he took Isaiah's shift last night. Something else that his little brother had trouble with: waking up. He shoved the peanuts in his pouch, slung over his shoulder and hanging down above his manhood. Before he moved to wake up Isaiah, he pulled out the one thing that he had left of his family's legacy besides the Brother's MacTavish themselves.

The handgun was holstered to his right hip; he was the only one in his family that had been right handed, and he preferred to have his hand and arm as close to his weapon as possible in case anything happened, anything at all. He drew it nice and slow, examining the shine that reflected off the wooden grip; the sunrise had risen almost past the bus that they had camped behind. The .22 caliber was the pride and joy of the Old Man. _Was _being the key word…

Calvin shook away the thought as quick as it had come; he hated thinking about him. About what happened…

He shoved the gun back into the holster violently before he stomped over to the bundle beside the dead or rather dying fire. Cal first kicked the fire out for good; better to not attract the things. He then sent his steel-toed boot right into the middle of the bundle, it responding with a grunt. "Hey, better get up now before I poor the rest of the water on you." Calvin hated his voice; he used to think it was deep, but compared to the Old Man, Grand Pappy, and Big Jim at work it was miniscule, like a mouse to a dog's bark. Isaiah had even begun to show signs of surpassing him in this vocal field, much to the annoyance of Calvin.

A low grumble came from the bundle, and after came the annoyingly deep voice. "What time is it?"

"Almost six, I should think," he replied as he took another look around. The site they had chosen to camp last night was one of the best they could have done so. It was the site of where a bomb had landed after the military decided it was a good idea to drop napalm and other destructive elements into the city. The small circular bowl in which the bomb had detonated was where they had set up there fire and all of their shit set around it. If any of the things tried to get to the pair, they would have to fall down a steep and almost un-climbable wall.

The only easy way in was a small gap in the mini-cliff, leading up into the forest. Roots and sticks stuck out of the walls of said gap, making it hard for people to actually get through there without being smacked in the face or breaking one of the roots or sticks, being noticed by whoever was listening and on watch that night or day.

Behind him Isaiah grumbled again, and from the sounds his sleeping bag was making he was attempting to rise. "Since when do we wake up at fucking-"

"Hey!" Calvin didn't allow his little brother to cuss; just like the old man wouldn't let either of them cuss at all in his house, despite them being the stereotypical Irish family and Cal being 27 years old. Isaiah grimaced and looked to the ground in apology. Cal turned back around to gather up his things, shoving his blanket into his backpack. "We need to get an early start this morning. Atlanta is only a couple hours away. Plus like Pop used to say; 'Early bird gets the worm'. We can get there and we'll get some food from the people there in no time."

"If there _is _people there."

Cal turned slowly to look his brother up and down. Isaiah, though they hadn't really gotten to hang out as brothers should have, because of their age difference, and though the younger MacTavish never told him about his social life at school, there was no doubt in Calvin's mind that he was the lady's man of his Senior class. His deep and shockingly blue eyes bored into your very soul it seemed, and the ladies of America, especially the younger and starrier eyed ones, were always a sucker for the combination of his blonde hair and blue eyes. Even now with his mess of a hair and a sort of desperation in the deep pools of his eyes, he was still a handsome MacTavish to behold.

Calvin had always considered himself handsome on the inside. No women in high school or even college had been after him. He always had to come to them and ask them out, or to even talk to them. All of his friends in school were young men, something the jocks and preppy little bitches in high school pointed out with a passion. He liked girls just like every other guy he knew. All of his 'friends' made fun of him for his red hair, his freckles, the fact he was Irish and his father talked with the heaviest accent the idiots had heard.

_They aren't laughing now, _he thought. _They're all dead or close enough as it doesn't matter._

Calvin shook the grim and evil thought away. He had a habit of thinking about the worst side of the coin. Something that had apparently wore off on Isaiah.

After a pause Cal asked "Why do you say that, Izzy?"

Isaiah shook his head and stuck his hand out, annoyed. "Please don't call me that. Anyways, what's the point of hoping people will be there? I mean, we've hoped before. We tried Fort Benning, which was overrun long before we got there. We tried back home, and not even things were there, just all burnt out and empty homes. We tried over at the Honeyridge Camping Site, and the only thing we found there was an RV that didn't work!" By the time he was done Isaiah seemed on the verge of raising his voice, but Cal could see tears in his eyes all the same.

The older brother rose and put a hand on the little brother's shoulder, smiling desperately, trying to get him to calm down. "Isaiah, all those places don't matter. From what we've seen, there's no sign that Atlanta is overrun, hell, even literally, we haven't seen one of those warning signs we saw for Fort Benning."

"Do you think that matters?" The blonde MacTavish was raising his voice now, more with sadness than anger. "People can take down signs, Calvin. If we don't see any signs, that could mean that the entire city is empty like home!"

Cal sighed, squeezing Isaiah's shoulder. "Izzy-"

Isaiah smacked his arm away so hard Cal thought it might come right off. "Don't _call me that!"_ The other MacTavish turned right back to his bundle and bag, shoving the rest of his things in there.

Calvin did not waste his time in gaping, although he did for a second. Isaiah had never acted like _that _before, not violently. But Cal didn't really make anything of it. He sighed lightly and turned to finish packing. Atlanta was waiting.

By the time they had packed all their shit and left their only good camping spot in months, the sun had risen all the way past the bus and had gone from a deep orange-red to a yellowish-red. The large line of vehicles had gotten denser and more wrecks were stumbled upon by the time they got to where they were now, on the freeway a mile from Atlanta, as said by an old direction sign, under a destroyed bridge that was split and broken halfway through.

While Cal was looking through one of the bags just left on the side of the road, Isaiah went to take a look around. Calvin told him to not wander too far off, things could be wandering around.

Izzy had a sarcastic remark for that: "Thought this place was supposed to be safe and sound…"

Calvin sighed and went back to the bag. After he heard that Isaiah's steps had stopped echoing, Cal frowned and looked up. There was nobody there. Isaiah had wandered off again.

Sighing again, he rose quickly and stomped toward the place Isaiah had paced off to.

Everyone could call Isaiah headstrong and tough, a true Irishman most of the family would call him. But all that didn't matter now, with the things wandering the earth. What mattered was skill and wisdom, survival instinct, something Isaiah lacked severely. Isaiah had seen the things before but seeing and interacting are two different things.

The most important aspect of Isaiah and this new world though: he had never…'killed'… a thing.

It was then that Cal heard the shuffling of feet behind the semi he was passing. "Jesus, you scared the hell out of me." He rounded the corner, rubbing his temples in annoyance with two fingers.

By the time it was on him he then realized that the thing he thought was his brother had no flesh on his face besides the rotten and flapping piece of decayed skin hanging from his neck. The things teeth were covered in long-dried blood and pieces of human skin stuck in between the gaps. It let out a raspy and rather medium sounding growl, mouth wide open, and lunged.

"Shit!" he growled as the thing pinned him up against the semi-trucks cargo-carrier. He had never tried it before but in disparity he head-butted the thing, and got an immediate, heavy ass headache from doing so. He was in a haze; a haze he thought went on for eternity, when he came to again. The thing was mere _inches _from taking a chunk of flesh out from his now tan and weathered face. He had to think fast, now.

"Isaiah!" he yelled out. "Isaiah, get the fuck over here!" The thing's eyes, furious and hungry eyes, bored into his own, every bite getting a centimeter closer. Cal reached for the .22 at his side, Ol' Reliable, his father called the weapon. It wasn't reliable then, where he could only brush the top of the hilt with the thing pushing him up against a wall here.

He could not seem to muster up enough strength to push the damn thing away, no matter how hard he pushed and struggled, the thing wouldn't budge.

And then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a pair of shapes moving. They too, moved at the slow pace that most of the things tended to move in. And at that moment, Calvin MacTavish was about to accept death.

_Boom!_

A deafening noise echoed throughout the tunnel and for a couple moments Calvin's ears were ringing with the sound of the gunshot. The other two shapes to his right fell right after the thing attacking him was gunned down by whomever.

Calvin vomited all over the ground beneath where he fell. He couldn't remember even falling down in the first place; the headache from the gunshot being at such close range and the head-butting business was returning and sending a haze through his mind.

But a thought escaped the mist: _Why was the gunshot so loud and _there_?_

He pushed himself up, wiping his mouth, and a muffled voice almost broke the void between the real world and the fuzzy, muffled word.

The shaking did it for him. "Hey, buddy, you alright?" The voice was still a bit muffled but he could still understand what it was asking.

Val rubbed his eyes and squinted them at the form where the voice was coming from. He could tell it was a male, a young man, maybe in his mid-twenties or early twenties. After a second he stopped squinting, realizing that the other guy was an Asian of some sort.

After a moment Cal shook his head out of the haze and replied, every word a challenge, "I'm… fine, yeah…" He looks around again, spotting another guy, black, this one was, with some riot gear on, along with a baseball bat with some barbed wire wrapped around the tip.

Cal tried his best to sound strong when he yelled out "Isaiah?" but it his voice cracked a bit when he did, despite his efforts. Isaiah gone would break him. He couldn't be gone, he wasn't and shouldn't be gone.

"Who the hell are these people, Cal?"

Cal laughed lightly aloud as tears welled in his eyes. He turned to see his little brother MacTavish pacing toward him, albeit cautiously. The older brother took another look at the two new people; the first _people_ they'd seen in months, and they didn't even get properly introduced yet. Though saving his life was enough for Calvin.

He sighed and turned to the other two , running a hand through his fiery-red hair. "I don't even know their names, so I couldn't tell you, Izzy." After he heard his little brother grumble and complain under his breath about the nickname, Cal grinned and stuck his hand out toward the other pair. "Calvin MacTavish. This is my little brother Isaiah. We're headed to Atlanta, heard there was a safe-zone there." He looks back and forth between them, both of them silent and staring. "You guys from there?"

The Asian guy put his head down, shuffling his feet. "Uh… listen, guys. I know you, like most of the other groups that we've taken in, came looking for this grand spectacle of a safe-haven and whatnot. That's not what you're walking into, trust me."

"Just row after row of walkers in the city, man." The black guy spoke finally.

"Walkers?" Isaiah asked the question as if he didn't know what it meant.

"That's what we call 'em." The black guy strode forward and put his hand in Cal's, shaking it firmly and with strength. "Name's T-Dog."

Cal returned the shake just as well as T-Dog did, strong and firm, though his face couldn't betray the fact that he was terrified; they could have walked right into that. Those… walkers… would have torn them limb from limb if they hadn't warned them. "So you guys saved me and my brother's life twice in a day, one time physically and you guys prevented a life threatening situation for the both of us."

The Asian guy smiled lightly, extending his hand. "No problem. The name's Glenn. Glenn Rhee."


End file.
